In 2025, Adfinis celebrates its silver anniversary. From humble beginnings in Switzerland, to a global driving force of open source solutions, the company’s journey over the last quarter of a century has been one born of determination – guided by a vision of digital sovereignty and an approach favoring collaboration over competition. We turn back the clock to the late ’90s, when the Open Source movement was just beginning and a radical new idea took root: bringing innovative, sustainable, and resilient open source technologies to the world. Through the bare-metal, cloud, and container eras of modern IT, we see how Adfinis has remained true to its ideals – even after 25 years of going from one success to the next.
Being a young professional in the late ’90s and early 2000s was a remarkable time. Many, especially in the IT sector, will remember the turn of the 21st century as a curious mix of hope, exhilaration, and anxiety: the peak of the dot-com bubble, an explosion in peer-to-peer file sharing thanks to the infamous Napster, and the rather anticlimatic passing of the Y2K bug. It was also a time when the term “open source” – shortly after being coined in 1998 – was gaining familiarity, the Open Source Initiative (OSI) was founded, and Apache, Mozilla, and Linux started to become household names. For all the ups and downs the new millennium brought with it, open source had started to become a cornerstone of modern software and an engine of innovation.
As a twenty-something-year-old who held multiple jobs and worked round the clock, Adfinis GmbH founder Michael Moser was no stranger to diving into things. He was ambitious but also frustrated – while completing his formal training in IT, he found himself stuck in a world dominated by Microsoft technologies, hidden source codes, and mandatory application bundles. It didn’t take much to spark his curiosity in an interesting alternative: Linux, an operating system allowing high customizability and performance without the high licensing fees. Initially dismissed by Microsoft as a type of cancer, Linux grew quickly to pique the interest of those fed up with the confinements of an off-the-shelf Windows box – a system that felt sealed in even after the package was opened and installed. It took Michael a while to learn the ropes and get things going, but with his first Linux server up and running, the birth of Adfinis was imminent.
A young Michael Moser in one of the first Adfinis offices in Bern, Switzerland
Michael, who comes from a small village in Switzerland, hadn’t been searching for fame and fortune; he had simply wanted something more efficient and practical for his needs, and thought there must surely be others who felt the same. He quickly found a kindred spirit in Matthias Blaser – a highly skilled software engineer who shared his burgeoning interest in open source and open web. With their complementary skills and an eagerness to see where the technology could take them, they each took a loan of 7,000 Swiss francs from the tech-savvy entrepreneur Claudio Fasciati, and created the beginnings of a new company – one that wasn’t about making a quick buck, but about investing in a promising technology stack that could open the door to entirely new possibilities for companies struggling with their IT systems and processes.
“We didn’t care about how much we would earn. What we wanted to do was invest in this technology stack and build up the infrastructure.”
Michael Moser | Founder, Chief Strategy & Growth Officer, and Chairman of the Board
They weren’t the only ones. Other up-and-comers saw the potential of source code that was readable, shareable, customizable, and distributable – the basic “freedoms” of open source software. SyGroup GmbH was one of them. Also Swiss-born, SyGroup was founded by a young group of open source enthusiasts – among them, Sven Leser (CEO) and the late Daniel Aubry (a technically gifted software engineer) – just a few months before Adfinis entered the market. While Michael and Matthias were the primary driving forces behind Adfinis, SyGroup was owned and driven by a larger group of people – in addition to Sven and Daniel, brothers Thomas and Sandro Köchli were among those who played a key role in the company’s development. Although the founders and employees of both SyGroup and Adfinis were no strangers to one another – they operated in the same circles and frequented the same local tech events – it would take 12 years until their paths would cross in a more deliberate way.
Like many early open source companies, Adfinis grappled with finding their feet in a proprietary-dependent world. The early days were anything but easy. They didn’t have (or want) external investors, and had little in the way of a refined business plan. Step-by-step, cautious growth was the name of the game. But this didn’t phase the head-strong Moser, who took on three external IT assignments during the first two years – all of them ironically in the Microsoft ecosystem, helping to fund the open source mission he believed in. Together, Michael and Matthias reassessed how they could build something that would last – not just technically, but economically.
Tipping the tables in Adfinis’s favor meant getting closer to what really matters to the customer. Not all businesses have a profound understanding of IT infrastructure, and many have neither the resources nor the will to do so. Learning from their earlier, rockier company years, the Adfinis founders realized that customers didn’t need to be savvy software specialists who could talk their developer lingo; they needed to be able to take away the customer’s pain points and create a better solution that not only works, but is also sustainable and resilient. Then, they would have a shot at competing with the bigger players in the market.
In the mid-2000s, there was growing momentum in the public sector for open source procurement processes. This opened up a new avenue of potential customers also searching for greater choice and control over their systems, as opposed to vendor lock-ins. It was also about the time, circa 2004, when Michael struck up a conversation with Matthias Stürmer, now President of CH Open (the Swiss Open Systems User Group) and Managing Director of Parldigi (Parliamentary Group for Digital Sustainability), about the importance of unrestricted digital tools. That same year, the two of them co-founded LOTS (Let’s Open the Source) – the first nationwide open source conference in Switzerland, aimed at building bridges between the tech community, public administration, and academia. SyGroup’s Sven was himself a driving force in establishing Parldigi (in 2009), and SyGroup became one of the first sponsors of this lobby group. It was the beginning of long-term partnerships in advocating for digital sovereignty and open standards, which saw Adfinis eventually become a long-standing member and sponsor of such associations.
Michael Moser today, Founder, Chief Strategy & Growth Officer, and Chairman of the Board
Through conversations and interactions at tech events, in forums, through advocacy groups, and with industry contacts, the Adfinis and SyGroup founders uncovered a thriving community interested in and dedicated to vendor-independent technologies. The open source community is, by nature and by cause, built on the principles of transparency, accessibility, and collaboration. That spirit of digital closeness and mutual support was captured in the name the founders had chosen for their company:
“Adfinis stems from Latin (ad meaning toward/near, and finis meaning end/limit), and conveys a sense of being closely connected, neighboring, or kindred in spirit or trust. That really resonated with us, and it’s symbolic of standing by your side until the end.”
Michael Moser | Founder, Chief Strategy & Growth Officer, and Chairman of the Board
The company's founders had understood that open source software was not just a technical solution, but a philosophy that found strength in numbers – where solutions became stronger, the more people who shared and contributed to them. Adfinis focused its business as a system integrator, forging stronger connections to open source system providers and working closely with each customer to not only meet but understand their unique needs. These connections – between people, technologies, and ideas – created the backbone of how Adfinis and SyGroup operated. Teamed with their deep expertise in Linux, web solutions, and software development, both companies were able to position themselves throughout the “VMware, Oracle and Microsoft era” of the 2000s as pioneers in the adoption of open source solutions.
As the company reached its ten-year anniversary, it had become clear that the tables had turned for Adfinis. They were steadily growing, had moved to a bigger office, and even hired their first official salesperson in 2011. Reaching a still-modest 15 employees, the founders – spurred on by Michael’s “no-pain, no-gain” mentality – decided to keep pushing. Coincidentally, the team at SyGroup was working on a similar idea, and one thing led to another. In 2012, the visions of Adfinis and SyGroup were united. As open source peers and competitors, both poised for the transition from a start-up to a scale-up, the companies merged to form Adfinis SyGroup AG. As one company, the employee numbers doubled and they were able to bring much more weight to their operations. Thomas, who was Managing Director at SyGroup, subsequently took over the role of CEO (Chief Executive Officer) at the newly merged company and played a leading role in its further development. Sandro, who had been part of SyGroup since 2004, became the new Sales Lead for the company, where he was pivotal in transforming the business approach to place greater focus on bigger enterprises. This helped Adfinis SyGroup build up and strengthen its customer base.
Sandro Köchli, Sales Engineer and Member of the Board
One of their first post-merger successes was building OpenOffice software for the Swiss Federal Court, after Oracle had stopped developing it. It wasn’t long before Adfinis SyGroup secured a partnership with Red Hat (also in 2012), and then with SUSE in 2014, positioning the company as a leading expert in the integration of Linux systems. Inspired by innovations stemming from the open source community, Adfinis SyGroup also ventured into the LibreOffice space, partnering with Collabora in 2018 to – among other things – bring open source word processing software to iOS. A year later, the company partnered with ownCloud to give users greater control over their own data in self-hosting file-sharing platforms.
The steady growth that ensued for Adfinis SyGroup called for a stronger structure and more dedicated roles. What the company wanted to avoid was a reliance on external investor equity; thus, talent from within was prioritized. In 2017, after many years with the company as both a software developer and Linux system engineer, Nicolas Christener stepped up as Adfinis SyGroup’s new CEO and CTO (Chief Technology Officer), and Thomas Köchli took over the role of COO (Chief Operating Officer). Nicolas, a staunch advocate of open source with close ties to various open source community projects, ensured a consistent strategy to remain on path and further enhance the technical excellence that Adfinis had housed from the start. With some of the company members having moved on (including co-founders Matthias, Claudio, and Sven), the company was in good hands.
The exit of Sven, who was one of the main shareholders, prompted a restructuring of the shareholder base to include more employees. Following the restructuring, the company was owned by Michael Moser, Nicolas Christener, Thomas Köchli, and Sandro Köchli in equal parts. A chunk of shares was owned by the company itself, enabling even more employees to become shareholders. Today, Adfinis has 16 shareholders, all of which work in the company: Christian Affolter, Nicolas Christener, David Grolimund, Lukas Grossar, Coen Hamers, Michael Hofer, Mihajlo Joksimovic, Sandro Köchli, Thomas Köchli, Fabrizio Maggiore, Michael Moser, Gil Oliveira, Ralf Scharly, Adrian Wittwer, Sascha Zimmer, and Christian Zosel.
In 2017, the company received the SUSE Innovation Award, and new open source partnerships were forged with Nextcloud (a file sharing and collaboration platform with full data privacy and control) and Mattermost (a secure messaging platform). The following year, in 2018, Adfinis SyGroup landed the first Swiss partnership with HashiCorp, specialists in automated and secure cloud infrastructure. Again, the following year, the company was recognized on multiple occasions for its collaborative strengths: In 2019, Adfinis SyGroup was awarded Best Partner of the Year from both SUSE and Red Hat, won ‘Best Newcomer’ at that year’s DINAcon Awards, and achieved Microsoft Gold Partner status – a sign that while the past may divide, the future can unite. Adfinis SyGroup became a trusted partner for delivering high-quality, scalable, and secure solutions, from cloud computing and containerization to automation and cybersecurity.
Nicolas Christener, Chief Executive Officer and Member of the Board
“We were never just consumers of open source tools, but active partners in the ecosystem. Our team of experts actively collaborate with the community to drive open source projects forward.”
Nicolas Christener | Chief Executive Officer and Member of the Board
For all the instability and uncertainty that the beginning of the 2020s brought with it – a global pandemic and recessions, say no more – it was also a digital awakening. A massive shift to digital tools helped maintain close connections despite physical distance. The normalization of remote working coincided with evolving mindsets about how systems and processes could be managed. The “cloud era” of the 2010s matured into the “container era” of multi-cloud orchestration, ushering in the widespread adoption of Kubernetes. Adfinis SyGroup were early embracers of an approach focused on the developer experience in managing cloud complexity, not just cloud migration. The company also embraced a remote-first work policy, which strengthened ideas that had been brewing about international expansion. For many, 2020 was a time of rebuilding and reframing – nonetheless Adfinis SyGroup, who rebranded themselves as simply “Adfinis”, reaffirming the company’s core belief in connection and a commitment to the end.
Connections that had previously been forged through customer projects and vendor partnerships gave Adfinis the wings to expand beyond borders. New management talent was spotted in Coen Hamers and David Grolimund, who were enlisted to found Adfinis Netherlands and Adfinis Australia, respectively. With this expansion, the company could embrace a follow-the-sun approach and enhance its 24/7 support for customers. New heights were also achieved when Adfinis reached HashiCorp’s ‘Hyper Specialized’ partner level, and entered into a new partnership with DevSecOps providers GitLab, which saw Adfinis swiftly climb the ladder to become GitLab ‘Select’ partner in 2021.
2025 is not only the 25th anniversary of Adfinis, but also the 5th anniversary of the company’s first two international entities. Adfinis Netherlands has built a strong network of loyal clients and partners, having established a solid reputation for themselves as a trusted and specialized open source expert in the Benelux region. Excelling in their customer development journeys, they are known for their ability to translate complex challenges into scalable, sustainable IT architectures for any business size. But above all, it’s their team spirit that Country Manager Coen Hamers values.
Coen Hamers, Country Manager Adfinis Netherlands
Adfinis Australia, spawned from an idea to enable 24/7 managed services that happened to coincide with a personal move Down Under, led to Adfinis's first team in the Southern Hemisphere. Country Manager David Grolimund still describes his talented team of system engineers as “the new kids on the block”, but doesn’t doubt their ability to rub shoulders with the big players.
David Grolimund, Country Manager Adfinis Australia & New Zealand
“I’m proud of the open culture we’ve built, and especially of the incredible spirit of our Dutch team. We’re close-knit, we challenge and strengthen each other, and just genuinely enjoy working together. That’s been key to building the strong reputation we have gained in only a few short years."
Coen Hamers | Country Manager Adfinis Netherlands
“Our move Down Under quickly became much more than a fitting coincidence, but about bringing more vendor independence to the Asia Pacific region. We see open source as critical infrastructure – open technologies lead to reliability and resilience, and set you up for the long-term – and partnering with Aussie Broadband to develop a cutting-edge cloud platform has affirmed our strategy: Numerous service providers, companies, and organizations are looking for agile and secure solutions without the constraints of proprietary lock-in. As the Australians like to say, we’re pretty stoked about what’s next!”
David Grolimund | Country Manager Adfinis Australia & New Zealand
Adfinis’s evolution from two small Swiss start-ups to an international company helped demonstrate that open source could thrive at a global scale. At this point in time, it was essential the company did not lose touch with its core values: Integrity, Collaboration, Transparency, Sustainability, and Excellence. The company set a clear vision and mission, cementing Adfinis’s commitment to innovative, sustainable, and resilient IT solutions. Assisting this strategic shift to global player, Adfinis soon delegated the role of Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) to Gil Oliveira (a Sales expert who had risen through the company ranks over the last 15 years, and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to Michael Hofer (previously Head of Engineering at the company). With a stronger management team in place, Michael Moser went on to focus his efforts on long-term strategic growth and took on the new role of Chief Strategy & Growth Officer (CGO).
It seemed only natural when, in 2023, Michael (Moser) reconnected with someone he had met at a conference some years back, who could help meet the growing appetite in Germany for digital sovereignty. Ralf Scharly, who at the time was a manager at IT system and cloud specialist company Erik Sterck GmbH, eventually shook hands with Michael and – together with colleagues Sascha Zimmer, Noah Nöthling, and Tobias Müller – brought over a seasoned team of DevOps engineers to found Adfinis Germany on August 1, 2023. It quickly became one of the most significant regions for Adfinis. The team has partnered closely with GitLab in building the German government-backed openCoDE collaboration platform, created cloud solutions with established German web hosting company IONOS, and contributed to the open source software platform openDesk, which is being utilized by the likes of ZenDiS (the German government’s Center for Digital Sovereignty), the Robert Koch Institute, and several others.
Ralf Scharly, Country Manager Adfinis Germany and Member of the Board
"The German market in particular places a strong emphasis on cybersecurity, data protection, and digital sovereignty. The opportunity to establish a company who cares deeply about these principles, and can back that up with robust and resilient solutions, made it a pretty easy decision for us. I knew Adfinis was onto something big, and we wanted to be a part of that."
Ralf Scharly | Country Manager Adfinis Germany and Member of the Board
The 2020s would no longer be remembered as a time of post-pandemic repercussions, but as the time when Adfinis made its global mark. With another couple of accolades under their belt – HashiCorp’s ‘Focus Partner of the Year’ (EMEA 2023) and GitLab’s ‘Services Partner of the Year’ award (EMEA 2023 and APAC 2024) – the doors seemed wide open for Adfinis’s next ventures.
The next expansion of Adfinis did not take long. Once again through the strength of professional connections, Adfinis opened up a delivery center in New Zealand, strengthening its foothold and reliability in the Asia Pacific region. Similarly, an opportunity was identified through a company connection to establish a future entity in Egypt. Since December 2024, Adfinis Egypt has opened up the company’s presence in the Middle East and Africa region, with a Cairo-based team specialized in tailored software development and developer experience. In the first quarter of 2025, Adfinis received SUSE’s esteemed ‘Solution Provider of the Year' award, highlighting Adfinis’s efforts in empowering businesses with open source solutions that are both innovative and sustainable.
The founding of five international entities in the last five years are seen by Adfinis as necessary steps in its mission to foster open source technology, deliver high-quality work, and run mission-critical systems around the clock so that their customers can focus on their core business. The next chapter of innovation and growth is at the doorstep, and Adfinis is well poised for the oncoming wave of digital solutions that will accompany our lives. Without openness, transparency, and interoperability, however, things like eVoting, eHealth, and AI-native products will not gain the trust necessary to become well-established or widely accepted. This is why Adfinis has been a key contributor in numerous initiatives for digital sovereignty, data protection, and security assurance:
“Adfinis ended up not just being a name we found in a dictionary and where the dot-com was available – it was a name that truly fit, and it still reflects who we are and how we work today. Close connections based on trust are the fuel for our endeavors.”
Michael Moser | Founder and CGO
Adfinis has also played a key role in developing and sustaining critical digital infrastructure. Inosca is a public sector community that uses an Adfinis-made system to digitalize and expedite the building approval process for local municipalities, and has so far been adopted by six cantons across Switzerland. The implementation of the Namespaces feature for OpenBao was a collaboration by Adfinis developers and the community for an open source secrets management solution that was initially forked from HashiCorp Vault. OpenBao securely stores, accesses, and manages sensitive data such as API keys, passwords, and certificates – Adfinis helped pick up where the big names left off or weren’t able to commit to more sustainable solutions. Such contributions and partnerships show that cutting-edge technology is not just for the techies; with the right approach, technology can unlock the ways that public organizations, private companies, educational and research institutions, and many, many more are able to utilize and build upon publicly available solutions. Digital savviness is not just for those apt in coding or fluent in digital languages; it’s a public right that should not be locked up behind proprietary contracts only affordable to the big players or the elite.
The Adfinis Executive Management team, from left to right: Michael Hofer (CTO), Gil Oliveira (CCO), Thomas Köchli (COO/CISO and Member of the Board), Michael Moser (CGO and Chairman of the Board), Nicolas Christener (CEO and Member of the Board)
With the company’s continued global expansion comes an evolution of its culture, uniting people of different backgrounds, nationalities, and customs. This, as company management puts it, is where the strength of the company lies: in its people. Long-standing employee tenures at Adfinis are a tribute to this culture – the Adfinis management team is proudly home-grown, and many who joined in the early 2000s are still part of the company, supported by a talent management approach that facilitates internal mobility and personal development. The open source mindset is, after all, built on the idea of bringing people together, sharing knowledge, solving problems collaboratively, and contributing back.
“When people join forces, much more is possible. When we have a shared purpose, we can really drive these ambitions and ideas, and create something big.”
Nicolas Christener | CEO and Member of the Board
Looking within and not only beyond, Adfinis is busy investing in its people and the next generation of tech talent. Supporting employees to, for instance, compete in the Swiss ICT Skills Championships or achieve higher professional certification status, is part of the strategy to have a company that will still be around long after the current Executive Management team has passed on the baton. Adfinis’s long-standing projects and partnerships have proven that forward-thinking actions trump having a chokehold on the here and now. In what could be likened to a David and Goliath story, Adfinis has overcome the odds to win the trust of a third of the companies making up the Swiss Market Index, and reach an annual worldwide company revenue of approximately 28 million Swiss francs.
But with rapid growth and unfazed ambitions, is Adfinis simply on a path to becoming the next Goliath? If you ask the management team, the answer is a resounding “No.” Always focusing on organic growth, the company has avoided a reliance on external investors and a dilution of ideals. Michael likes to refer to Adfinis’s journey as their own kind of mission to Mars. Aboard their rocketship, they’ve touched down on new soils, avoided head-on collisions, and forged international allegiances, but they’re only part of the way. “We’re only done with the first 25 years of our mission,” says Michael. “I might not be acting in the same capacity another 25 years from now, but I’m confident we can sustain our growth and our passion as we continue to develop.” The company, it seems, won’t rest on its laurels in advocating open source and everything this means for more collaborative, long-term solutions. “There are still a lot of great relationships to build,” adds Michael.
Adfinis will mark its 25th anniversary in 2025 with a celebration in Bern, where the company is headquartered. This September, Adfinis will pay homage to those who have contributed to and helped shape all that the company and its partners have achieved – and all that is yet to come. Current and past employees, early adopters of the Linux ecosystem, innovators in open source software, and fellow IT enthusiasts will come together for a party that’s as much about celebration as it is about nurturing the connections the company was founded on and grew from. Both within and beyond the tech industry, Adfinis draws its strength from meaningful and mutually beneficial relationships. Adfinis’s success is not just measured in revenue or market share, but in the impact the company has made on the open source community, the clients it has helped transform, and the way it has fostered a culture of innovation. Here’s to 25 years of pushing boundaries, and to many more years of collaboration in shaping a future built on open source.